


We colour the world with our hope

by Sororising



Series: Colourblind Steve fics [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: A very awkward hug, As in eighty years of it, Childhood, Colorblind Character, Disability, Fluff, Lots of colour symbolism, M/M, Pre-CA:tFA to post-CA:tWS, Slow Burn, Some angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-25
Updated: 2016-08-29
Packaged: 2018-08-11 00:29:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7867951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sororising/pseuds/Sororising
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Are yours blue?” </p><p>The question makes Bucky jump, and he feels an irrational stab of hurt. There’s no reason Steve should know his eye colour, is there? </p><p>“Nah, mine are sort of gray. Not very interesting.”</p><p>Bucky’s never seen anyone’s mood change so fast.</p><p>“So when I look at your eyes, I’m seeing them the way they really are?” Steve’s voice is almost awed, and if it wouldn’t have been blasphemy to have the thought even cross his mind, Bucky would have sworn that Steve sounds like he’s just seen an angel.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [以希望为世界增彩](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8103190) by [hamLock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hamLock/pseuds/hamLock)



> This is the first in a series of planned (unrelated) short fics about Steve being colourblind. On that note: if you are from a country where you spell it 'color' and this fic is jarring to read because of that, feel free to let me know and I can easily do a find and replace on my copy and send it to you with the different spelling.
> 
> Unbetaed, feedback is very welcome!
> 
> Title from the following quote:
> 
> “We colour the world,  
> Not with the darkness of our pasts,  
> But with the rainbow of our hope.”  
> ― Jenim Dibie, The Calligraphy of God

* * *

Red is the one that starts it off. One of the old ladies at church who just love to pinch Bucky’s cheeks and go on about how he’ll be such a heartbreaker when he grows up - they mostly just sigh a little when they look at Steve, or make the sign of the cross over him if he’s looking particularly sickly that day - throws out an offhand comment about Bucky’s lips being red as roses. 

It annoys Steve, for some reason that he can’t quite figure out. Bucky just ducks his head and looks up through his stupidly long eyelashes, smiling at her in that way that’s guaranteed to charm every dame in sight. And then he seems to forget about the whole thing after they’ve said their polite goodbyes, swinging his arm round Steve’s shoulders and marching them out of the churchyard, loudly humming the closing hymn.

Steve goes along with him, though he can’t carry a tune anything like the way Bucky can, and he pretends he’s forgotten as well. But he can’t stop thinking, running it over in his head: _lips as red as roses,_ trying to find the place where the words catch and stop making sense to him. 

Later, when Bucky’s over at Steve’s place and they’re picking through the scraps of the Barnes Sunday lunch that Bucky had carried over with him, he brings it up.

“Bucky? What’s red like?”

Bucky looks beyond confused. “What? Red’s red, Steve. It’s not _like_ anything.”

Steve scowls, unfairly frustrated with Bucky for not following along. “Yeah, but I don’t know what red is! You know I can’t see how it’s different, and I don’t get it, and that lady at church said your lips are red and what does that even _mean?”_

He lets out an annoyed breath and flops down onto the floor, knowing he’s being dramatic but really not caring. He just wants to understand, and he isn’t sure why it matters so much to him, but he’s had that outburst building up inside him since church, or maybe for years, and suddenly it _does_ matter.

It had taken them a few years to even figure out that Steve was colourblind. He’d been helping his ma with the laundry she sometimes took in to make ends meet, and she’d asked him to pass her the green shirt. Steve had heard people talk about colours and things, and he’d never quite understood what they meant, but he’d never felt like he was missing out on anything until that day when his ma held up two shirts to him and said in a shaky voice: “Do these look different to you, darling?” She had wiped her tears away almost instantly when Steve had scrunched up his face and said “That one maybe has a button missing, I guess?” 

But he had seen them, and since then he had sometimes wondered, in the back of his mind, just how special these colours were that they could make his ma cry.

Now Bucky looks like he’s taking the question more seriously. 

“I don’t know how to explain it, Stevie, I’m sorry. Red is like - ugh. I don’t _know_ what it’s like. But we’re going to find it out, I swear.”

Bucky has a look of determination that Steve had only seen on his face maybe once or twice. The first time had been when they were six or seven, and Bucky’s knuckles were bruising up from punching out some guy who’d been hassling Steve for being Irish, and Steve was bleeding in about a dozen places, and Bucky had said in a voice that made his words sound like an official proclamation: “Ain’t nobody going to mess with you like that again. We’re best friends now, so it’s not allowed.”

That hadn’t even been remotely true, of course. Well, the bit about them being friends had been, though Steve still can’t quite believe it some days. But Steve had been beaten up again, and again, and eventually he’d accepted that this was just how his life was meant to be. He’d either stand up for what was right and get knocked down for it, or he’d just walk on by and probably get knocked down on the next street anyway. Might as well try to do some good where he could.

Thinking about his fighting reminds him of something.

“Hey, Buck. Blood is red, right?”

Bucky looks uncomfortable all of a sudden. “Well, yeah.”

“I’ve had more nosebleeds and split lips than I can count. So I guess I know what red tastes like, maybe? Even if I don’t know what it looks like?”

“No!” Bucky seems as startled as Steve by how loud that one word comes out.

“Bucky?” Steve asks cautiously, not wanting to upset his friend. Bucky is twisting the corner of his shirt round his finger, and Steve reaches out gently to stop him. They’re both still in their Sunday best, after all, and he doesn’t want Bucky to mess up his clothes just ‘cause Steve had said something dumb. Even if he isn’t really sure what it was he said wrong.

Bucky jumps at the first brief touch of Steve’s hand on his, but it seems to calm him after that.

“Sorry. I’m fine, I’m good. It’s just - red’s nice, okay, it ain’t just - blood, and that sorta thing. We’ll find you a better taste for red, alright?”

Steve nods, relieved that things seem to be back to normal. “Sure, Buck. Whatever you say.”

* * *

He’s almost forgotten about that conversation when a few weeks later Bucky comes marching up to him with a handful of strawberries wrapped in a handkerchief.

“I’ve been testing out red foods, and I think these are right.”

Steve blinks, caught off guard by Bucky’s declaration - from the sounds of it, he’s been thinking about the problem of how to convey red to Steve for a while, and that idea makes something warm fill Steve’s chest.

“Oh, that’s great,” he says, putting down the book he’s been trying to read for the past hour. It’s nice to have a distraction from the way the letters keep hopping around on the page and twisting themselves into new shapes as soon as he takes his eyes off them. He makes room for Bucky to sit next to him, wincing as he sees the darker patches on the once spotless handkerchief.

“Buck! Your hanky - it’s going to be stained forever now. Don’t think even my ma can get that out.” 

“S’okay, Stevie. Nothing wrong with a little colour, eh?” Bucky laughs, and Steve elbows him in the ribs, but not hard enough to hurt. He kind of likes how Bucky can joke around about stuff like this, when even his ma doesn’t seem to be able to crack a smile some days if Steve’s lungs are especially bad or his backache is setting in for a long winter.

Steve would rather make a joke about himself than _be_ the joke. Or even worse, be just something for everyone to pity. Bucky’s laughed at him plenty of times, but never _at him,_ and Steve thinks that makes no sense except for how it does. Bucky thinks of him as a person who just happens to have a whole long list of things wrong with him, when half the neighbourhood seems to see him as either a walking corpse or a future angel. It gets real tiring sometimes, trying to remind everyone - whether it’s with his words or his fists - that he’s just a regular guy inside, and he loves how he’s never once had to work at convincing Bucky of that.

And now Bucky’s trying so hard to give Steve something that he’s never had, and it’s one of the nicest things anyone’s ever done for him. If he’s being honest with himself, he really doesn’t care that much about colours most of the time. It’s not like he can fully understand what he’s missing out on, and his sketches at school always come out a lot better than Bucky’s even though he supposedly can’t see so well. He isn’t sure what all the fuss is about. 

But then there had been that moment, over a month ago now, when some odd new feeling had flared up inside him at the thought of Bucky having red lips, whatever that meant, and there being some aspect of Bucky that Steve couldn’t see, couldn’t commit to either memory or paper because his stupid eyes just refused to work properly.

He’s been lost in his head too long, and Bucky is holding out a strawberry to him expectantly. 

“Come on, these are the best I’ve found yet. They must have grown ‘em down south somewhere. Mister Jones let me have a few for sweeping up his back yard.”

Steve takes one, silently glad that Bucky hasn’t just borrowed a handful of strawberries without asking. They’re both fiercely protective of other people in their own ways, but their moral codes don’t always quite line up when it comes to things like personal property that nobody will miss, or returning lost goods that they find left out on the street. Bucky is more of a _finders, keepers_ kind of guy, whereas Steve sticks to the principle of _do unto others_ as much as he can manage.

They bite into their strawberries at the same time. Bucky was right; these are the nicest Steve’s ever had. Not that he’s been given the chance to eat strawberries very often; apples and bananas are the only fruit Steve’s ma usually brings home. This tastes like spring: fresh and clean and new.

He glances over to see Bucky finishing his off, lips wet from the juice and a wide smile on his face. 

Steve’s heart beats in odd rhythms at least twice a day, and he’s never figured out just what sets it off. But this time doesn’t feel quite like that. It feels like something is trapped inside his chest; it’s not painful exactly, but he isn’t sure yet if it’s a sensation he likes either.

Bucky waves at him, another strawberry already in his mouth, snapping him out of his daydream again.

Steve has to clear his throat to make sure his words come out in the right order. “Yeah, this is a good red,” he says. “I’ll remember it, promise.”

As if he could forget. Bucky’s lips turn up even more, still shining, and Steve’s heart feels like it skips another beat as he commits the picture to memory. He guesses that his idea of red might not be quite what Bucky intended, but it’s the one he’s going to keep with him forever.

* * *

Orange is too easy, after that. It annoys Steve, because it seems too neat that the food that’s the right taste of _orange_ happens to be called orange as well, but Bucky just tells him that people are dumb and to _remember what that tastes like, okay, because we won’t see another one for a while._

So Steve shuts up and tries to hold the sugary-sour flavour in his mouth for as long as he can. It’s a little fruit, squashed and with a funny dimpled texture that Steve wants to try sketching, but he doesn’t really get what Bucky means when he says it’s _bright._ He remembers, though, and when a week later Bucky helpfully tells him that the scarf Junie’s aunt knitted for her is orange, Steve pictures a sort of sweet, snug light curled up around her neck, and thinks that maybe people just don’t have enough imagination when it comes to naming things.

* * *

Yellow takes a little while, mostly because it takes Steve a few weeks to realise that Bucky’s stuck on fruits being the only way to find the tastes of their colours. They’ve tried a few now without success. He doesn’t know where Bucky’s getting some of them from; he hopes he isn’t getting into trouble just for Steve, but he knows he’d be a hypocrite if he said that so he keeps his mouth shut and tries every fruit Bucky eagerly presses into his palm.

Right now, Bucky’s licking plum juice off from where it’s dripped down his hand, looking content even though he’s decided that plums aren’t right to be yellow, and Steve can’t take his eyes off the way his tongue is wrapping around each finger and - and he needs to find a distraction, fast.

“What about dinner foods? Or breakfast?” Steve’s voice comes out mostly steady, thankfully.

“Eh? Oh, for yellow? Hey, that’s a good thought, you know. I guess they don’t all have to be fruit. It’s just fruit and vegetables have some nice colours in ‘em. Most of our dinners are kinda browny grey.”

Bucky’s looking thoughtful now, his mind racing off on some complicated line of thinking that Steve knows he’ll explain as soon as he’s followed it through to the end.

Sure enough, it’s only a couple of minutes before Bucky speaks again. “But I don’t think that matters, maybe? If it’s just for you. Like, strawberries and oranges really _are_ red and orange. But if an orange went blue, I reckon it would still taste orange, y’know? So maybe yellow doesn’t have to really be yellow for me, so long as it’s the best yellow for you? You know what I mean?”

Steve absolutely does not know. But Bucky looks real pleased with himself, and Steve doesn’t want to spoil that just because he’s a little confused.

“That makes sense. So, um. Am I supposed to figure it out myself, then?”

He doesn’t like that idea much. Part of the fun of this has been having something for just him and Bucky, a quest all for them like in the old stories about King Arthur and his knights that Steve’s ma used to tell him when he was lying sick in bed.

Bucky frowns, not looking like he’s a big fan of that idea either. “No, no. I can still help. We just have more choices now.”

“Maybe if you tell me a bit more about yellow?” Steve suggests. “Like, what’s it feel like to you?”

Bucky wrinkles his nose up, and Steve’s fingers itch for a pencil. He’s captured probably hundreds of Bucky’s expressions over the last few years, but he doesn’t know if any of them are quite right. Maybe if he had colours they would be better, he thinks.

“Well, yellow is...it’s warm, I guess? The sun’s yellow, for one. And fire is kind of yellow and orange. And it’s sort of a happy colour? I don’t know, Steve, this is weird! I never thought about all this before.”

“No, that works for me. It’s more than I thought about yellow before, at least. Thanks.” 

Bucky flashes him a grin that’s too fast to be quite real, and jumps up. “Anytime, pal. Hey, how d’you know I’m not making all this up? Yellow could be an icebox sort of colour, but you never even check with anyone else.” He pauses, looking almost anxious for a moment. “Do you?”

“No, course not!” It hadn’t even occurred to Steve to double-check Bucky’s colours against anyone else’s. And as soon as the idea has been put into his head, he dismisses it without a second thought. “I like your colours, Buck. I want those ones, not anyone else’s. And they’re mine now too, so no takebacks.”

It’s that very same night that they find yellow, and it’s a taste they’ve had more times than they know how to count. Steve’s ma has sat them down at the dinner table, and they’re playing their usual game of trying to kick each other's ankles without her noticing. She doesn’t have the time or money to cook a big meal all that often, so if they’re eating more than one course it usually means they’re at the Barnes house, scrapping with Bucky’s sisters for the best cuts of meat.

But this is his ma’s speciality: a hearty, warm Irish stew with a baked potato on the side and the promise of a homemade custard tart for afters.

Yellow gets mixed up in Steve’s mind after that meal. He thinks that it was over their bowls of stew that he and Bucky first exchanged a secret look that said _hey, guess we found it now, huh?_ But by the time they’ve finished every lick of custard Bucky is still giving him that same soft look, and Steve isn’t sure if that means custard is yellow too, or if it’s yellow but not _their_ yellow, and either way he doesn’t think it matters. They have another colour now; that’s the important part, and Steve likes that he helped find this one.

* * *

Green is surprisingly hard, even though there's a whole lot of green foods. Steve knows that cabbage is green, unless it's in soup when Bucky says it's more grey, but Bucky says it's not right, it's not the right _taste_ to be Steve's green; they have to keep looking.

It's an apple in the end, which Steve thinks is kind of boring. He's had hundreds of apples before; they come bruised and cheap practically by the bushel in warm Septembers. But this one is different, somehow. It's bigger, and smooth for once, no mushy bits that he can see. He and Bucky are lying on the grass in the park, sun shining overhead in the best Indian summer anyone in Brooklyn can remember. He's about to start eating it when Bucky snatches it out of his hands and promptly takes a bite. 

“Hey! I got that from Mrs Cleary for helping her carry her groceries. What gives?” Steve should be more outraged than he is, but he’s mostly just confused. Bucky’s usually the one pushing Steve to eat more, to get some vitamins in him so that he can maybe catch up a bit and not be _such a shrimp, Rogers, c’mon, one more bite._

So this is out of the ordinary for them, and Steve is in that odd mood where he’s almost angry but the sun is too warm on his face and the air smells too clean - which is rare, in Brooklyn - for it to turn into anything much. If Bucky wants the apple, he can have it. Steve has this moment, and that’s more than enough for him.

But then Bucky sits up fully, looking almost wild, and tugs Steve upright as well.

“Stevie!” Bucky is - happy? About an apple? “Steve, this is it! This is - no, wait. Close your eyes. Breathe in.”

Steve obeys, not feeling any less confused but not wanting to question Bucky when he’s in such a good mood. Not that he would have argued much either way. He’s always dragging Bucky into scrapes and fistfights without asking first, he thinks the least he can do in return is go along with whatever this is.

So he shuts his eyes, and inhales. He can smell the freshness of the grass; the curious heaviness the air always has at the end of a New York summer; the faint smell of flowers drifting towards them on the breeze. He breathes out, and in again, and this time he can smell the sharp tang of the apple, and along with it a hint of Bucky’s sweat - he must be holding it close to Steve’s face.

“Take it, Steve.” Bucky sounds almost urgent, and he still has that thrill in his voice that makes Steve respond without thinking, makes something in him rise up and answer by taking the apple from Bucky’s hand, brushing against the soft skin of his palm as he wraps his fingers round it.

He doesn’t turn it round when he bites down. He could mark the other side, the side that’s still smooth and unbroken. But instead he sets his teeth so they overlap with the bite that’s already there, and presses down.

It floods his mouth, juice and sour sweetness and _summer_ and _Bucky,_ and he swears he knows what Bucky’s about to say before he hears it.

“It’s green, Stevie! That’s it, that’s green for you!”

* * *

Bucky goes into a sulk when they find purple before they find blue.

“It’s just not right. There’s an _order_ to it. That’s what the rainbow is!”

Steve rolls his eyes. “Okay, Buck. Whatever you say. But I _like_ purple, and I’m comfy right now, and I’m sure we’ll find blue soon enough.”

They have Father Thomas to thank for the taste of purple. Some rich old lady had donated a Christmas hamper to the church, and Father had roped Steve and Bucky into helping him give the food out to the congregation as everyone left Mass. They were good at it; they knew who could use an extra jar of preserves, or which household would be more grateful for a tot of brandy than for ten loaves of bread.

When the big basket was almost empty, Father Thomas had handed them a package each. “For your family, James, and one for you and your mother, Steven.” Then his eyes had twinkled and he had pulled out another package, this one small and wrapped in shiny paper. “And this is just for you boys. A little Christmas luxury, as thanks for your help.”

They hadn’t been able to open it until the day after; Bucky’s parents and Steve’s ma had long ago resigned themselves to the fact that their sons were near enough inseparable, but Christmas Day was a day for family, and no matter how much Bucky and Steve had protested that they got that, but they _were_ each other’s family, they had been overruled.

But the next day had found them in Bucky’s tiny attic room, curled up under every blanket they had been able to find, with mugs of warm milk perched on the floor next to them. Bucky had let Steve open the box, and he had peeled the ribbon off as carefully as he could, opening the flaps to reveal two beautiful dark chocolate creations.

They were works of art, to Steve’s eyes, and he was tempted to never eat his, to save it up and just _look_ at it every so often, at the thick swirling pattern and the delicate sprinkle of what smelt like cinnamon on the top. But he knew that if he suggested that, Bucky would go along with his idea, and he could see that Bucky’s mouth was already watering at the thought of the chocolate, so he had plucked one out, offering it to Bucky, and then picked up his own.

Steve had bitten the tiniest piece he could manage off, letting the flavour spread onto his tongue. It was _amazing,_ rich and strong without being bitter, and somehow creamy and crumbly at the same time. Out of the corner of his eye he had seen Bucky bite his chocolate in half, and then scowl darkly at the leftover half after he had chewed a few times.

“Bucky, what’s wrong?”

“This tastes kind of purple,” Bucky had said reluctantly, clearly remembering that there was no taking back a colour once it had been decided on.

Steve had taken another little bite, leaning in closer to Bucky as he did, and hummed to himself.

“Purple’s nice. Guessing we won’t have it so often as yellow, though.”

Which had led to their argument about discovering purple before blue, which had turned into a pillow fight, which had ended with one of their mugs getting knocked over and both of them falling into hysterical laughter when Steve had said _no use crying over spilt milk, boys_ in a voice that sounded _exactly_ like Sister Joan.

When they’ve cleaned up and settled back under their blankets, Steve realises he still has most of his chocolate left; he had quickly put it back into the little shiny box once Bucky had whacked him with the first pillow.

He takes it out again now, and carefully bites it exactly in half. He holds out the second half to Bucky, not quite looking him in the eyes.

Bucky doesn’t take it from him with his hand. Instead, in one fluid movement, he ducks his head down and closes his mouth over Steve’s fingers, drawing back with the chocolate in his mouth.

They eat quietly for a few moments, passing the surviving mug of milk back and forth between them to wash the chocolate down.

Then Bucky breaks the silence with a sigh. “Alright, I guess purple’s not so bad. We’re going to have to find something real special for blue, though, I tell you.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of Bucky's POV now, hope you enjoy! Feedback very welcome.
> 
> One note: I deliberately left Bucky and Steve's ages vague in this fic, but it roughly starts off with them as teenagers.

* * *

It’s a few months after they find purple when little Sally Baker comes flying down to the Barnes house on her brother’s old bike. It’s first thing in the morning; her pigtails are streaming out behind her, and tears are starting up in her eyes. It takes her a few seconds to get her breath back, but then she gasps out something about _Sarah Rogers_ and _my mama told me to come get you,_ and then Bucky is taking the bike from her and he’s pedalling faster than he ever has in his life.

He has visions of Sarah choking out her last breaths as he rides, and it’s only a few minutes walk to Steve’s place so he’s there in no time on the bike, but somehow it feels like he’s already too late, and then he bursts through the door and sees Steve curled up on his ma’s bed, Mrs Baker hovering awkwardly next to him, and he _knows_ he is.

He flings himself at Steve before he even thinks to say a word, not stopping to wonder if Steve even wants anyone to touch him right now. But after a second he feels thin arms wrap themselves around him and cling on tight, and he wouldn’t let go for anything.

Distantly he hears Mrs Baker saying her goodbyes and something about sending some food up, and then gently closing the door behind her. As soon as she’s gone, Steve sinks back further onto the bed, pulling Bucky with him until they’re curled up together, so close that it’s hard to tell where one body ends and the other begins.

Bucky realises that he hasn’t actually spoken yet, and opens his mouth to - what? Comfort Steve? He isn’t sure that’s possible right now, and anyway he thinks he might be crying and his words probably wouldn’t come out right. So he holds Steve close, and they shed their tears together, and when Mrs Baker pokes her head round the door with apple pie they half-heartedly take a few bites. It tastes nice and has the perfect amount of cinnamon, but right then it’s the least colourful food Bucky can imagine, and they set it down only partly eaten.

* * *

They don’t talk about their colours for a long, long time, after Sarah dies. Bucky isn’t really sure why. But he’s never known what to think about any of this, and he doesn’t try too hard to work it all out in his head. He’s a bit afraid of what he might find if he did. He had scared himself, back when Steve had first started to talk about red and how it was like blood. Something inside him had been so anxious at the thought that Steve would forever see red - which could be so many things that Bucky couldn’t even remember a quarter of them: roses and apples and the rug in front of his fireplace and the robes on the Sacred Heart statue at church - as something that meant he was in pain.

So Bucky had protested, barely knowing why, and all the while his mind had been working on other solutions. The thing Steve had said about the _taste_ of red had made the decision for him: he was going to find the right foods to give Steve his colours. 

He had made sure to focus especially hard on every bite of food he’d taken over the next few weeks. His ma had thought he was getting sick; he usually wolfed his dinners down, and now here he was carefully chewing each mouthful, thinking about _redness_ and whether or not whatever he was eating could ever measure up.

Then he had seen the little punnets of strawberries laid out at the grocery store, and he’d bargained an hour’s work for a handful that would have been overripe by the next day.

And now they have five colours. It feels strange, in a way, because Bucky knows that colours don’t really belong to anyone - or if they do, they’re for everyone rather than just a few people - but something about this game they’ve set themselves makes it feel like they’re the first people in the world to discover just how wonderful colours can be.

It isn’t really a game, to Bucky. He isn’t quite sure what it is.

It takes months, but he finally persuades Steve that they should move in together. Their first night in their own apartment - too small for one person, never mind two, and the furniture’s falling apart and he thinks there might be mice, but it’s not too cold and it’s _theirs_ \- Bucky brings home two pieces of a custard tart that the wife of one of the men he works with at the docks had made for everyone to share.

He doesn’t think anything of it until he sets it down in front of Steve. They both realise what it means at once. The last time they had custard tart it had been made specially for them by Sarah, and there was no way this one could ever be as good. It hadn’t been the time they had figured out their yellow; that had been a long while ago now, but the fact that it had been part of the discovery of one of their colours makes it more special than most foods. 

Well, to Bucky, anyway. And he thinks to Steve as well, if the expression on his face is anything to go by.

“Sorry,” he says, feeling oddly nervous all of a sudden. “I wasn’t thinking. I just wanted something nice for our first place together.”

He blushes as soon as he’s finished speaking, because _our first place together_ sounds a lot more, well, _more_ than he’d wanted it to. He knows that he’s bad at hiding his feelings, so he thinks that maybe Steve knows and is just too kind to bring it up, but he could at least not say dumb things like that out loud.

Steve takes a spoon and digs in more hesitantly than Bucky’s ever seen him when it comes to food, even when he gets so sick he can barely choke down water. 

The first mouthful makes Steve look wistful, and Bucky can tell he’s not quite present as he swallows it down. But he’s smiling a little by the second bite, and when he pushes the other slice across the table with a pointed little wave of his hand, Bucky knows that everything’s going to be alright.

They eat in comfortable silence, both remembering their own versions of the same long-ago meal.

Steve sighs a little when he’s finished, but he doesn’t sound upset.

“Hey, Bucky?”

“Yeah?”

“We never did find blue.” Bucky holds his breath, and Steve continues: “Maybe we should start looking again?”

He feels the rush of relief through his entire body.

“Yeah. Yeah, Stevie, we can do that.”

* * *

They do look for blue, but it’s a slow and infrequent search, carried out more or less without words. Steve might bring home a can of something unfamiliar from his new job sorting stock at the grocery store, or Bucky might liberate a spare piece of some foreign delicacy from his co-workers’ lunches, swapping it for a half-sandwich or a slice of apple pie. Most of the guys he works with are either immigrants or born from them, so there’s a nice mix of foods from all around the world that get passed round and mulled over.

But it isn’t like either of them suggest anything out loud; they don’t say _oh, never had that before, wonder if that might be blue?_ No, they share the food as if there were no other meaning to it than simply keeping each other fed, talking about their days in-between mouthfuls and then curling up next to each other, almost full and content just to lie in silence.

A few times Steve begins to suggest that this taste might be right, but Bucky shakes his head at every one and changes the subject. He doesn’t know how to explain that they shouldn’t rush this, that there are other shades and tints in the world they haven’t discovered yet: pink and peach and lilac, but that blue is the last real colour they have left to find.

That isn’t the only reason he’s so certain they haven’t found blue yet. It’s - it’s a special colour, to Bucky at least, and he can’t tell Steve _why_ but that doesn’t make it any less important.

Then one day he comes home from work to find their apartment cold, and Steve lying motionless in his bed. Bucky rushes over and feels Steve’s forehead - an old instinct honed over many years - but he doesn’t feel feverish.

“I’m fine, Buck. Not sick. Just a bit sleepy, is all.”

“Alright, pal. Whatever you say.” Bucky knows that Steve will respond badly to any expressions of concern right now, so he just lights their landlord’s pathetic excuse for a heater up and sits on the bed, keeping still in case Steve wants to go back to sleep. 

“Bucky?”

Steve’s voice is quiet. He sounds worse than tired; Steve’s more than used to tiredness with the way his body runs through energy like their stove gets through gas. He sounds - weary.

Bucky’s heart clenches, which he ignores. “What’s up?”

“Why is blue so important?”

Oh. Bucky feels like he wants to crawl into a hole and never come out. Steve knows more about Bucky than anyone else in the world. Probably more than the rest of the world put together, including all Bucky’s family. He knows how his breath smells first thing in the morning; he knows that Bucky’s secretly a bit of a dandy, especially when it comes to his hair; he knows that the best way for Bucky to get a good night’s sleep is for him to have Steve safe and sound next to him, even when he’s rattling shallow breaths into his lungs and tossing and turning with fever. 

But there are some things that Bucky wants to take to his grave, and he thinks the importance of blue might be one of them.

He owes Steve more than he can ever say out loud. He knows that people might think it should be the other way round, but Steve has shown him that there’s still some good in the world, something worth fighting for. He knows that Steve wouldn’t be afraid to say the truth, so somewhere within him he finds the courage to speak what he’s really thinking for once.

“Um. Well. Your eyes are blue, so.” 

Not his most eloquent speech, but he’s rarely anything but tongue-tied when it comes to saying what’s in his heart. He can turn on the charm easy as anything when it comes to to complimenting a dame, but he can’t do anything but stutter right now even though all he’s doing is stating a simple fact.

Steve is silent. He lifts his gaze up - his eyes seem bigger and more blue than ever, somehow, with the echo of those words still hanging in the air - and looks directly at Bucky. It doesn’t seem like he’s actually trying to communicate anything, though, more like he’s examining him. It feels like it does when Steve draws him; Bucky is something more than a still life but not quite a person in those moments.

“Are yours blue?” 

The question makes him jump, and he feels an irrational stab of hurt. There’s no reason Steve should know his eye colour, is there? 

“Nah, mine are sort of gray. Not very interesting.”

Bucky’s never seen anyone’s mood change so fast. It’s like a lightning bolt has been shot through Steve’s body; he sits up and pushes the blankets off him, and looks even more intently at Bucky.

“So when I look at your eyes, I’m seeing them the way they really are?” Steve’s voice is almost awed, and if it wouldn’t have been blasphemy to have the thought even cross his mind Bucky would have sworn that Steve sounds like he’s just seen an angel.

It’s as though a fire has been lit somewhere deep inside him. Bucky’s heart is going to burst out of his chest, he swears. That thought had never, ever occurred to him.

“I - yeah.” _Come on, Barnes,_ he tells himself, don’t lose your words now. “You’re right, Stevie. Ain’t that something?” Well, it was no heartfelt speech, but hopefully Steve could see something of his true feelings in his eyes. 

His eyes, which Steve had been seeing properly for all the time they’d known each other.

They don’t talk any more about why blue is a special colour. It seems that all Steve had needed to hear was _your eyes are blue._ Which was good, because that was all the explanation Bucky had known how to give.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked it! Next chapter back to Steve, and the start of the war.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a short chapter before the long final one! Thank you so much for the response to this story so far <3

* * *

As soon as Steve hears the news that war has been declared, he knows what’s going to happen. No matter how hard he fights it, Bucky will be sent away, and Steve will be unable to follow him. 

When Dr Erskine proves him wrong, days pass before it sinks in.

He’s going to war.

And then - he doesn’t. He gets through basic training by the skin of his teeth, and he’s picked to receive the serum even though he can’t help but think that someone has just made a mistake; any minute now some lackey will come running up with the paperwork and they’ll make him step down, send someone strong and healthy up in his place. 

He feels that way right up until the metal casing - he tries not to even think the word _coffin_ \- has closed with him trapped inside, and the first needle bites into his skin.

Afterwards, he can barely remember what he had actually felt when the serum was doing its work. The pain was so overwhelming that the specific locations of it had been secondary concerns. He thinks he could feel his bones shifting and grinding against each other; he definitely remembers his heart feeling as though it was about to explode, and a sharp stabbing pain inside his head, but other than that everything was just a blur of misery and nausea.

His eyes are one of the only parts of him that don’t feel like they’re on fire when the process is over, which makes him all the more startled when he opens them and sees the world in what he knows must be colour. He doesn’t have time to process it fully before he’s in action, stumbling down from his pedestal and running as fast as he can, a voice in the back of his mind singing about how _good_ it feels to tell his body to move and to be obeyed.

 _Rebirth,_ he thinks, and runs even faster.

The USO tour is a deliberate whirlwind of colour. The Star Spangled Singers are in matching red-white-and-blue, of course, just like him, and they joke around about how making miniskirts out of the flag seems a bit too close to desecration for a tour that’s supposed to be all about patriotism. He likes them, the girls, especially after they realise that he genuinely isn’t trying to get lucky with any of them. They treat him like one of their own after that, teasing him and making him draw little caricatures of himself, and he doesn’t hate what he’s doing but what was the point of all this if he isn’t even trusted to fight?

Peggy is different; he can’t help but still feel tongue-tied around her. If there was ever a person that wasn’t meant to be seen in black-and-white, it’s her. Not just because of her flawless red lipstick - he stamps down memories of a boy, long ago, with a wet mouth that he knows now would have been the exact same shade - but because of her _presence;_ the way she commands the attention of everyone in a room no matter how high-ranking they are.

Adjusting to colours is more interesting than he would have guessed. He really hadn’t known what he was missing out on, he realises, and the change in his vision causes him to do more than a few doubletakes at everyday objects that have suddenly taken on a whole new dimension.

One day, Peggy catches him smiling as he bites into an apple. He finds himself wanting to explain why, but he can’t make the words leave his mouth. It would feel like a betrayal, he thinks vaguely, but he isn’t sure of who.

* * *

He doesn’t feel truly at home in his new body until he meets the eyes of a broken man lying on an operating table, and sees the exact same shade of gray that he’s known for what feels like his whole life.

* * *

Steve and Bucky both try a lot of new foods over the next two years, both alone and together. Standard fare in the war is predictably awful, somehow bland and over-salted at the same time, and almost always a colourless mush that Steve finds unappetising even though it’s not far off what every single thing he’d eaten since he was born used to look like. But every time they visit a new country, somehow they find the chance to taste a dish with ingredients they’ve never heard of, or old foods put together in ways they would never have thought to do back home. 

England, France, Belgium, Austria: all have new delicacies which the locals are more than willing to share with the troop Captain America belongs to. Rationing barely seems to slow them down when it comes to proving that their country does hospitality and good home cooking better than anywhere else out there.

But no matter how many dishes are placed in front of them with the smile on their host’s face that transcends language barriers to say _eat up, now, it will be the best thing you’ve ever tasted,_ no matter how much they enjoy them - or pretend to, when it comes to France and they find out that snails really are on the menu there - none of them are blue. 

Steve doesn’t mind anymore that they have a color missing, and it isn’t because he can see them for himself now. 

No, he’s alright with it for one simple reason: some part of him believes that so long as their colours aren’t complete, they can’t leave each other.

* * *

When Bucky falls, Steve’s mind goes blank. It’s absurd, but the only thing he can think of to say when Peggy gently prises the second bottle of whisky from his grip is: 

“He can’t be gone, though. He just can’t be. We never - we never found blue.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked it :) still unbetaed, any feedback is more than welcome.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you like the ending! There is a big time jump in this chapter to after the events of the Winter Soldier, so just assume everything there is pretty much the same as canon. Thank you all for reading, feedback is very welcome as always!

* * *

It’s been over a month since Steve and Sam had booked into yet another room in some rundown motel somewhere just outside Houston. They’d been searching for traces of Bucky all across the US - Sam was convinced that without HYDRA’s support there was no way he could have left the country; Natasha just raised an eyebrow at hearing that assumption, which made Steve immediately doubt its truth - and they had finally been almost certain that they’d found the right trail.

As Natasha had calmly pointed out on one of her rare phone calls to check up on them, the fact that they’d found any trail at all was highly unlikely to be down to their investigative skills. She assumed that Bucky was leading them into a trap, whereas Steve had been clinging to the idea that it meant Bucky wanted to be found. That he wanted help. Sam had been the diplomat, reminding Steve that some people needed to be stopped rather than saved, and reminding Natasha of the opposite.

And then, one unremarkable night on what Sam insisted on referring to as the _road-trip of ultimate tragedy,_ they had walked into their twin room and found him waiting.

Steve will forever be grateful that Sam’s first instinct was to quietly close the door and lean against it, rather than to call for help or whip out the gun that was tucked inside the back of his waistband.

His own instincts, of course, had been screaming at him to rush over to the figure standing by the window and throw his arms around him - and possibly shed a few of the thousand tears that have been stored up inside him since their mission on the train.

Instead, he’d put his bag down, spread his hands out to show he was unarmed, and spoken one word.

“Bucky?”

“Not yet,” had been the reply, after a few long seconds of silence. “But I’m ready to come in.”

Since then they’ve been staying in Sam’s house in DC. Steve is certain that they’re going to outstay their welcome any day now, and is on high alert for the first sign that Sam wants them gone; but so far things have been going about as well as they could ever have hoped for.

Bucky is - well, _not yet Bucky_ was one way to put it, but he’s already doing much better. Sam’s current theory is that the version of the serum he was dosed with is working overtime to repair the connections in his brain in the same way it would work to heal muscles and flesh. And it’s true that more and more memories seem to be returning, a thought which makes Steve’s heart leap every time he thinks about it for too long.

Of course, Bucky’s mind healing itself comes with some major downsides. Every step he takes forward in remembering his old self seems to go along with two steps back as he starts to recall the details of every mission from the past seventy years, every instrument that was used to torture him, every time they had prepared him for cryo.

Sam has been incredible, but all three of them know that they’re out of their depth here. The problem is, they have absolutely no idea who they can trust. Anyone at the old SHIELD could be compromised, and Steve thinks the other Avengers would help if they could but he’s not sure this is really their area of expertise. Sam knows a lot of therapists, but none that are qualified to be let in on what has the potential to be a national secret on par with the _SHIELD is actually HYDRA_ revelation.

So they keep going on their own, as best they can. Sam goes back to work, and Steve helps take out a few HYDRA bases - Bucky says he should be the one to do that, but if Steve can fight still then he can damn well fight for the both of them - and Bucky stays inside, healing slowly.

Food turns out to be one of the most complicated aspects of the modern world for Bucky. As best as they can work out, his captors had kept him going on some kind of all-purpose nutrition and protein concoction, usually pumped straight into his stomach through a feeding tube. So not only does his digestive system barely know how to cope with solid food anymore, Bucky has very little muscle memory at first when it comes to basic things like cutting food up, or even how to chew and swallow it.

Steve has been in more fights than he can even begin to count, but he doesn’t actually enjoy causing people pain. But when he thinks about Bucky staring at a soup spoon as though it was a deadly weapon, or the expression of confusion on his face when Sam had handed him a mug of hot chocolate - something Bucky had never been able to resist, back in their Brooklyn days - Steve thinks that if he had the HYDRA agents responsible for creating the Winter Soldier alive and in front of him, he would find it very hard to restrain himself from executing them excruciatingly slowly, one by one.

Still, there has been progress. Sometimes Steve wonders if he’s clinging on to too-small signs that Bucky is improving, but when Sam grins at him one day and tells him that _Bucky just ate two whole pancakes,_ and _remember when he could barely choke down a smoothie, man, he’s getting there,_ Steve finally allows himself to hope.

Food isn’t the only way Steve measures Bucky’s recovery, of course. He has mental notes that count up hours slept without nightmares; minutes spent outside Sam’s house without any flashbacks; the amount of knives missing from the kitchen at any given moment. But food was always a significant part of their lives growing up, and it’s hard for him not to focus on that now. Admittedly, their conversations about food as children had mostly revolved around _how do we get enough_ or _how do we make this taste less disgusting,_ but then Steve had asked that life-changing - to him, anyway - question: _what’s red like?_

And after that food had taken on a new kind of meaning, one which still holds true to Steve even after their worlds have been ripped away from them both and stitched back together in a patchwork that he could never, ever have predicted.

One day, Steve tosses Bucky an apple, which he catches without moving a single muscle other than those in his wrist and hand. He looks at it with a blank expression. Inspecting it for needle marks or other signs of tampering, most likely.

“You’ll like it, Buck,” Steve says in an attempt to distract himself from that thought. “Apples are all nice and green, these days.” 

He flinches as soon as the words have left his mouth, but doesn’t make any effort to clarify them. He prepares himself for Bucky to have no idea what he’s talking about, the same way Sam clearly doesn’t. If he braces himself against the pain, it might hurt a little less. At the least, the other two people in the room might not realise how every breath he takes feels like it has to make its way past the stone that seems to be lodged in his throat.

Sam very deliberately looks at the crimson red apple in Bucky’s hand.

“I’m missing something, aren’t I,” Sam says. It isn’t a question.

“Always, kid,” Steve answers him, unable to resist throwing Sam a wink and then laughing at the shocked look on his face. He’s still on edge, waiting for Bucky’s reaction, but teasing Sam is one of the few things that makes him happy in this new century, so he indulges himself whenever he gets the opportunity.

Sam throws up his hands in mock despair. “I can’t believe no-one knew how much of a joker Captain America was. Barnes, it was worth getting you back just to see the real Steve Rogers in all his asshole glory.”

Bucky’s mouth twitches. For a moment it seems like he’s about to say something, but instead he looks down at his hand, as if he’d forgotten that he was holding something in it. He glances at Steve quickly with an oddly defiant look, and then bites into the apple.

How can two apples, close to a century apart, make Steve’s heart race like he’s sixteen again?

“What were the others?”

Bucky’s voice is hoarse; he doesn’t talk much, and neither Steve or Sam push him to. He has seventy years of torment to process, he can heal on his own time. 

It’s still one of the best sounds Steve has ever heard.

“Others?” Steve can’t quite bring himself to hope that Bucky means what he thinks he does,

“Colours.” Bucky’s tone very clearly implies an unvoiced _obviously, dumbass._

Steve glances at Sam, figuring that he owes him a quick catch-up before they have this conversation.

“I was colourblind until the serum, you know? So, um, Bucky tried to find foods that represented different colours for me. So I’d have my own version and wouldn’t feel - left out, I guess.”

It’s such a simple explanation for something that fundamentally altered Steve’s world.

“Wow,” Sam says, and then falls silent for a moment. “That’s - I’m not going to make fun, man, stop looking like I’ve kicked your puppy. Seriously, that’s adorable.”

“Steve doesn’t have a puppy,” Bucky says, and immediately takes another bite of his apple, as if he wants to keep his mouth occupied so he doesn’t accidentally speak again.

Sam laughs. “Fine, kicked your Bucky, then.”

Is it Steve’s imagination, or is Bucky blushing slightly? His own cheeks are definitely turning red at hearing those words spoken so casually: _your Bucky._

He clears his throat, turning towards Bucky and pretending that he didn’t see Sam’s knowing expression. “So, anyway. Red was the first one. Strawberries, best ones you could find.”

_Bucky’s lips turn up even more, still shining, and Steve’s heart feels like it skips another beat as he commits the picture to memory. He guesses that his idea of red might not be quite what Bucky intended, but it’s the one he’s going to keep with him forever._

He thinks that both Bucky and Sam are looking at him as though they know he isn’t telling the entire story, but he ignores them and reaches back into his memory.

“Then orange was an easy one,” he says. “Um, orange was oranges. Which annoyed me, but now I can see them properly I still think it’s the best one.”

He pauses to take a breath, leaving space for someone else to join the conversation if they want to. No-one speaks, so he continues.

“Yellow...I’m still not sure what yellow was, really. My ma’s stew, I guess, or that and custard tart together? Just, warm home cooking and family.”

He misses Sarah suddenly, fiercely, in a way that seems barely appropriate considering she’s been gone for either years or decades, depending which way you look at it. He blinks back any tears that might be forming and tries to keep himself anchored to the present. He’s in Sam’s kitchen. With Sam, and - somehow - Bucky. The year is 2015.

“I guess you’ve already figured out that green was apples,” he says, and thankfully his voice doesn’t break. “Or, well, some apples. I don’t know.”

He wants to stop talking about this before he can’t hold himself together any longer, but if it’s helping Bucky then they can go through the rainbow a thousand times.

“You wanted to kiss me. That day, with the apple.” Bucky’s voice is still rough, but he sounds certain of his words, though he couldn’t have known they were the truth even back then.

Steve is startled into honesty. “I wanted to kiss you a lot of days, Buck.”

He doesn’t look at Sam. He wasn’t going to lie, not when Bucky already spends hours every day doubting his own memories. Still, he can’t take in that his biggest secret has just been spoken out loud as though it’s nothing.

Bucky’s frowning, a line deepening in the centre of his forehead that Steve only knows is a frown because he’s spent an unhealthy amount of time categorising Bucky’s every facial expression.

“I remember purple. But. Blue is first, right?”

Steve can’t help the laugh that comes out of him, slightly strained but heartfelt nonetheless.

“That’s exactly what you said then,” he says, thankful that his voice comes out - mostly - steady.

Bucky looks as though his mind is somewhere far away. Years away. “He wanted to kiss you too. With the chocolate.”

It’s a knife slipped between his ribs, skilfully angled so that you don’t realise how much pain you’re in until it’s over; the wound has been inflicted and all you can do is bleed out.

Bucky had wanted to kiss him. He doesn’t doubt that’s it’s true, not for one moment. But the knowledge that they could have been something more, all those years ago, coupled with Bucky saying _he_ rather than _I_ \- Steve opens his mouth to answer, with no idea what he’s going to say, and flinches as all that leaves him is a sob.

Bucky’s eyes are wide. He looks almost worried, and startled too, as if he hadn’t thought about the effect his words might have on Steve before he said them. Which he shouldn’t have needed to do, of course. This was Steve’s problem, and he should just leave Bucky and Sam to talk like functional adults - or, well, adults at least - and go deal with it himself.

Bucky looks at Steve, takes a step towards him, and then pauses. Steve doesn’t move. Bucky glances at Sam - god, what must Sam be thinking right now? - and moves towards him instead.

Steve has no idea what’s happening anymore. He can feel his pulse in every inch of his body; he’s hyperaware in a way that feels like it should be impossible for anyone to sustain for longer than a few seconds. Of course, he’s capable of breathing through physical pain that would kill an average human ten times over. This probably isn’t so different.

Bucky moves slowly when he’s next to Sam; he telegraphs every movement, presumably so that Sam can move away if he’s uncomfortable. He doesn’t _look_ uncomfortable, just confused, but Steve is glad that Bucky’s aware of the possibility.

Awkwardly, still holding the half-eaten apple in his metal hand, Bucky moves Sam’s arms up and out slightly. Then he nudges him in Steve’s direction and - Jesus, Mary and Joseph, is Bucky making Sam _hug_ Steve?

Then Sam’s in front of him, looking questioning, and Steve can hear exactly what he’s asking even though he hasn’t said a word: _fully informed consent, alright, even if it’s just a pat on the back._

Steve doesn’t know whether he’s feeling touched or humiliated right now - some combination of the two, probably - but he opens his arms and hugs Sam anyway. It feels nice; of course it does. Hugs always feel good when they’re with someone he trusts - he never turns down a hug from a fan, even when they only want one so they can take a selfie of it for posterity, but he always feels not quite right in his own skin whenever a stranger touches him - and Sam has proven himself worthy of being very close to the top of that short list.

“I feel like I should put this on my resumé,” Sam says with laughter in his voice - not mocking, just a gentle amusement that puts Steve even more at ease. “Cuddle proxy for supersoldiers.”

Bucky has retreated to the other side of the kitchen. He looks calm, though Steve’s seen him take out a dozen opponents without a hint of a facial expression, so he doesn’t know how much that means. 

Steve decides that since Bucky had wanted him to hug Sam, he’s just going to stay here for a while longer. 

“You’re missing out, Barnes,” Sam says lightly. “Steve gives the best hugs.” There isn’t even a hint of pressure in his voice, but Bucky’s next bite of his apple is almost angry, and he drops it onto the counter even though there’s still at least half left.

Steve doesn’t want to let go of Sam just yet, though he thinks he probably should when he sees Bucky moving towards them looking like he’s about to go into battle.

Sam just unwraps one of his arms from around Steve and holds it out to Bucky, who scowls but walks towards it anyway. And then just _stands_ there with them - Steve and Sam have automatically angled themselves in Bucky’s direction and made room for a third person, but he just stands as close as he can, his body in contact with both of them, but not lifting his arms or doing anything to indicate that he’s going to participate any further than this.

Steve doesn’t think he could imagine anything in the universe more awkward than this hug, and he never, ever wants to move.

* * *

After that, things seem to be improving slightly faster. Bucky’s idea of what constitutes normal physical contact is way off the mark - he once tapped Steve on the shoulder and then spent an hour glaring at his hand as though it had betrayed him - but any sign that he’s starting to learn it’s alright for him to initiate touch, instead of just passively waiting for someone to do something to him, is a hopeful one.

He’s eating more, and not just what Sam and Steve put in front of him. He takes random foods from the kitchen and goes back to his room with them, but sometimes they eat dinner together and it all feels absurdly domestic.

And best of all, Steve and Bucky have started talking, properly. Steve still gets through about ten sentences for every one word of Bucky’s, and sometimes he says something about their past that leads to him barely seeing Bucky for the rest of the day, but other times they end up having actual conversations. Some are about the old days, of course, but many are about their new lives now, and the ways they can try to fit themselves into a world they could never have imagined.

Today, though, they aren’t talking much. Sam’s out at work, and Steve is half lying on the couch, absentmindedly sketching. Bucky is perched in the armchair across from him, and he’s been staring at Steve for at least an hour.

It might be unnerving to anyone else, but Steve has a very low bar for being made uncomfortable by ex-assassins watching him.

“Did you ever find it?”

The question startles Steve even before he’s taken in the actual words; if anyone ever disrupts the silence in the house it’s almost always Steve or Sam.

“Find what?” Steve asks on autopilot, mind racing ahead to the answer he thinks Bucky might be going to give.

“Blue.”

He puts his pencil down, conscious of every movement - even the rise and fall of his chest.

“No. Not without you,” he says, hope keeping his words stark and honest. “I didn’t even try.”

Bucky nods, as though he hadn’t been expecting any other answer, and stands up. Steve feels a brief flash of disappointment when he thinks that their conversation is over already, but then realises that Bucky is moving towards him.

He sets his sketchbook on the couch, still open at the page where he’d been trying to capture the way the metal plates of Bucky’s left arm shift and shine in the evening light.

He has nothing to hide.

Bucky stands over him, looking as though he’s waiting for something. Steve holds his breath, not wanting to do anything to break the stillness of the moment. He feels - absurdly, considering how little effort it would take Bucky to snap his neck - as though he’s facing down a spooked animal, like any movement he makes might shatter something so delicate that it would never be able to be put back together.

“Christ, you’re slow,” Bucky says under his breath, and reaches out, easily tugging Steve up until they’re standing face to face, with much less distance between them than there normally would be.

Steve swallows down the desire that can’t help but rise up in him. “Buck? Is this - um. What is this?”

Bucky, impossibly, moves closer.

“What do you want it to be?”

That should definitely not be Steve’s decision. Bucky is the one who’s been through every layer of hell and a few more besides. 

But if Steve asks what Bucky wants again, they’re going to go around in circles forever. And they’ve already lost so much time.

He pictures a boy, coloured in sepia tones in his memory, holding out a handkerchief filled with bright red strawberries.

That hadn’t been an easy choice for Bucky to make, Steve would bet.

He remembers a boy who shared his colours, his world, and he decides to be brave.

“I’ve wanted to kiss you ever since that day we found red,” he says, and Bucky’s lips are on his before the last word has escaped into the air.

It’s nothing like strawberries, or apples, or even chocolate. 

Bucky kisses softer than Steve had expected. It’s almost hesitant, the way he moves; after the first touch he follows Steve’s lead. Not in a passive way, more as if he's content to just stay like this, in contact with each other, for as long as possible.

Steve has no idea how much time passes before they draw back from one another. Not far, just enough so they can see into each other’s eyes.

It’s probably his imagination, but he thinks that his own eyes are reflecting their colour into Bucky’s, the gray tinted with the faintest hint of blue.

Maybe some colours aren’t so easy to define.

Maybe one is a moment, a kiss, rather than anything more tangible.

Steve closes his eyes, feeling the truth of their colours, complete now, ease a faint ache inside him that he hadn't even known was there.

He moves forward again, and Bucky moves with him, so that their lips meet once more a breath before he’s expecting it.

Behind his eyelids, Steve sees blue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edited to add: I moved the original poetic ending bit to the notes below if you still want to read it, I didn't think it was flowing quite right after everything else being in Steve's POV.
> 
> "Blue is ice, yet also the deepest, brightest flame. The last breath you take before you plunge into the sea, and the first you take in a new life. 
> 
> Blue is alien: an electric glow from a force that could destroy worlds. But it is also home: long winter nights curled together for warmth as the light fades outside the window.
> 
> Blue is drowned innocence and unwanted experience. The sky above, and the waves below.
> 
> Blue is the gaze of two sets of eyes, reflecting everything in each other. It is the taste of a lifetime of shared breaths and swallowed words.
> 
> It is past and future, love and loss.
> 
> Blue is memory."
> 
> Sorry if you were hoping for me to find the perfect food for blue, I did try a few and they all felt a bit anticlimactic after literally eighty years of waiting so I went a different direction in the end.
> 
> Aw I'm sad this fic is over, looking forward to posting a couple more colourblind Steve fics since I have so many headcanons about it. Thanks for reading!!


End file.
